Texan corporate Anadarko postpones New Zealand deep sea drilling plans
Auckland, August 5 2011 - Greenpeace NZ is celebrating the news today that Texan corporate Anadarko has postponed plans
to drill test wells off the Taranaki and Canterbury coasts this summer.
The news comes hard on the heels of the Government’s failure to find any takers for its offshore oil block offers off
Northland’s coast.
A story in the Energy Bulletin, published today, quotes Anadarko as saying that it has not been possible to find a rig
early enough in the season to carry out its planned drilling programme.
However one unnamed industry commentator is also quoted in the story as crediting Anadarko’s announcement to the
flotilla-based protest that Greenpeace, te Whanau a Apanui, Ngati Porou, and various other organisations mounted earlier
this year to disrupt Petrobras’s seismic survey off the East Cape (1).
“This is another major nail in the coffin for the Government’s programme of the deep sea oil drilling in New Zealand,”
says Greenpeace NZ Climate Campaigner Steve Abel.
“Our best opportunity for prosperity is going to come from making the transition to a smart clean economy, and of course
clean energy is a vital part of that,” says Abel.
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(1): Energy Bulletin (www.energynewsbulletin.net) provides a paid subscriber service. The following quote comes from an unnamed source, and appears in the story
‘Anadarko pushing back NZ deepwater plans,’ by Neil Ritchie, published today, Friday, 5 August 2011:
“And there is the likely intense scrutiny its operations will come under by such environmental organisations as
Greenpeace,” he said, referring to the protests against the deepwater seismic survey off the East Cape earlier this year
for Brazilian oil giant Petrobras.”